Monday, May 23, 2011

The Fox Movie Channel is running a new series on Monday nights called Unvaulted which, like the Fox Legacy series, brings some older movies to the screen, although this time withough any introduction from a Tom Rothman type. Just before The Incident on Saturday, FMC ran a promo pointing out that this week's selection would be the Sean Connery science-fiction cult movie Zardoz, airing at 8:00 PM and 10:00 PM. Indeed, their web-site mentiones the same thing, and says that Zardoz will be airing a third time, at 2:00 AM.

That third airing seems a bit odd, but then FMC has some odd programming choices. However, both my satellite box guide, and some of the online listing services I've checked tell a different story. They're saying that this week's "unveiled" movie will be the equally deserving Pickup on South Street, at 8:00 PM and 9:30 PM, followed by Zardoz at 11:00 PM. (It should be pointed out that the set-top box guides and the online TV listings services get their info from the same few souces, so it wouldn't be surprising that a lot of places disagree with FMC's website.) FMC's website is saying that Pickup on South Street will be airing later this week, on Thursday morning I think.

I have a feeling that it's going to be Zardoz as at least one listings site also mentoins it, but don't bank on that. Besides, FMC could just as easily have gotten the promo wrong. In the past few weeks alone TCM has run the wrong promo for an upcoming Essential (the promo for Cat People was run a week early), and had a piece for a movie with Star of the Month Esther Williams mentioning that the movie in question would air in prime time Friday, not Thursday.

Addendum:

So it turns out that last night's "Unvaulted" movie on the Fox Movie Channel was in fact Zardoz, and not Pickup on South Street. At least it's good to know whether I should trust the FMC website or the box guide listings.